Seriously, Mormons? Seriously?

In the last week I've had more interaction with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints than I've had in years. The learning curve isn't steep here, but there's a few things you'll need to know to genuinely appreciate this:

1. I was raised Mormon.
2. I am not now a practicing Mormon.
3. I am now a practicing Wiccan.
4. Points 2 and 3 above cannot coexist in Mormon dogma, nor do I have any interest in having them coexist.
   
5. I've been happily married for nearly 7 years.

So, the first thing is that "my" home teachers show up, out of the blue. It's not something I asked for, they just arrived. It's kind of my fault, since I buzzed them in without thinking. In my defense, I think I though the door buzzer was my wife asking me to let her in because her hands were full. Still, it was kind of a stupid thing to do.

I can only assume they showed up because I'm on the "inactive" list of the local ward, since I'm still on the rolls and haven't actually been to a Mormon service in well over 10 years. That makes me, in the eyes of the stake and full-time missionaries, a prime target. Why? Because, if they can get me active, it's assumed that I'll bring my wife along as well since I'm the head of the household and all.

They really don't know her very well, but that's another story that I won't go into here.

Anyway, they wanted to "deliver a message". I was polite, took the envelope, and politely told them that I wasn't really interested. And then, after they left, I reminded myself to never ever ever buzz someone into the condo stairwell without first making them identify themselves.

I flipped through the message, which was a photocopy of something from something called The Liahona (whatever that is; I thought the Church organ was The Ensign, but it has been a decade since I last bothered to look). It was written by someone called President Eyring and titled "Home for Christmas", and it drove home to me how much I've changed in the last decade.

The idea was to leverage Christmas to make me want to be "enveloped in the love and the Light of Christ", long for eternal love, pine for my eternal home, and come back to the Church. The questions they were supposed to hit me with to trigger this included

1. When you read the material under the heading "Longing for Eternal Love," do you feel within yourself the longing for your eternal home? Discuss together what you are doing to prepare to return to that home.

That's pretty much where it would have broken down, had I bothered to let them present the "lesson". I don't feel any particular longing for an eternal home. I like where I'm at. I conditionally[1] believe in reincarnation, so I'm not expecting to go to an "eternal home" when I die. I'll either come back for another go around, or I won't. But where I'm going isn't particularly important; it's where I am now and what I'm doing now that's important. So, obviously, I'm not doing anything to prep for that return. Instead, I'm working on being a good human being here and now.

The rest of the questions really, really depend on giving the "right" answer to that first question. So I won't even bother to transcribe them.

But wait! It gets better!

So I check my mail today, and I've got a slew of Christmas cards. One is from an address that's a little smudged, and that I don't recognize. When I open it, it's from another set of Mormons.

Specifically, from the "Single Adult Reps of the Cherry Grove Ward", inviting me to the monthly Single Adult activities.

Yeah, that's right. I've been married for seven and a half years, and the Mormons invite me to the Meat Market.

I just...

...well...

I mean...

What. The. Fuck?

I've got nothing here.

So, in closing, let me just suggest you have a look at The Advanced Bonewits' Cult Danger Evaluation Frame. Particularly if you choose to talk to those nice young men with an eye towards taking their religion seriously.

[1] I believe it to be true, but lack any genuine evidence. Ask me again after I'm dead, and I'll let you know.

Elements: Why Limit Yourself?

A few weeks back, while celebrating Mabon at the local Unitarian church, I tossed off one of those casual, offhand remarks that sticks with you and comes back again and again. We were talking about the elements. You know, the traditional Hermetic four elements: Air, Water, Fire, Earth. Partway through, I said "One of these days, I'm going to host an esbat where, as an experiment, we'll use the Chinese five elements instead. Just to see what happens."

A little, offhand comment. But one that stuck with me, and that started me asking questions that I couldn't find answers to. Why four elements? I mean, I know that the Greeks loved all over the four elements we use today, and that we use them because Hermetic magic and the Western Mystery Tradition has had an overwhelming influence on all European-derived magical systems. Hell, if you're Wiccan (or any flavor of neopaganism influenced by Wicca) you can't swing a besom (let alone your dead familiar) without hitting a half-dozen Hermetic concepts.

And I know that Gerald Gardner, the founder of Wicca (and, as a result, a large chunk of modern neopaganism) was also a Rosicrucian and a member of the OTO. It stands to reason that, when he began building the ritual structure of his fledgling religion, he'd go with the practices he knew.

But, I also know that the Hermetic ceremonies that give us neopagans the "calling of the quarters" were much more than just lighting a candle in each compass direction and mumbling some quick couplet asking "[element] to lend its power to the circle". It seems to come from John Dee's system of Enochian Magic, and directly from the Golden Dawn's Opening of the Watchtowers ceremony.

Now, I'm fine with the idea that concepts evolve. A ritual can be created for one purpose in one magical system, and be changed and adapted for a completely different purpose in another magical system. Neopagans don't necessarily need to invoke the Watchtowers to guard a magical circle, because (a lot of the time) the neopagan magic circle is simply consecrated ground for a worship ceremony. But what do the elements do, when we invoke them? And, since we're deviating so far from the Golden Dawn version, why do we limit ourselves to the Hermetic four elements? Why not use the Chinese system of air, fire, water, metal, and wood? That would seem to work at least as well as the Western version. Ot we could use the periodic table, create a magic circle divided into 18 segments with 7 divisions each, and knock ourselves out ("I summon the power of Ruthenium to the circle...").

I suppose I have no actual answers right now, just a rambling encouragement to, as they say in those loathsome self-help books, "think outside the box". Try something new. Experiment. Don't feel like you have to limit yourself to a particular way of doing things, just because that's how "the book" says you should do it.

We're not the people of the book. We're the people of spirit, of natural magic and of the ancestors. Give it a whirl.

Peter's Back!

I am giddy as the proverbial schoolgirl over this. After 6 months of painful withdrawal after Peter Paddon stopped producing The Crooked Path Podcast, he's back!

Go forth to Peter's Crooked Path, and enjoy.

Luminous Beings Are We, Not This Crude Matter

So, you may have seen the Yahoo! News article (or the LiveScience.com article) titled "Strange! Humans Glow in Visible Light". If you haven't, well, go check one of them out. Or the original PLoS ONE article "Imaging of Ultraweak Spontaneous Photon Emission from Human Body Displaying Diurnal Rhythm", if you feel like getting your hardcore science nerd on. Go ahead. I'll wait.

"Youuuu...
"light up myyyy....
"liiffe."

Back yet? Good. Here's the abstract from the original paper, if you didn't read that part:

The human body literally glimmers. The intensity of the light emitted by the body is 1000 times lower than the sensitivity of our naked eyes. Ultraweak photon emission is known as the energy released as light through the changes in energy metabolism. We successfully imaged the diurnal change of this ultraweak photon emission with an improved highly sensitive imaging system using cryogenic charge-coupled device (CCD) camera. We found that the human body directly and rhythmically emits light. The diurnal changes in photon emission might be linked to changes in energy metabolism.

So, we glow in the dark. And, if our eyes were a whole lot more sensitive, we'd be able to see it. I'm not going to go all pseudoscientistic on this and claim that this explains the aura - I don't even vaguely believe that - but I'm tickled nigh unto death to learn that I glow in the dark.

Even if I can't see it.

An Anniversary!

201 years ago today, the Tunguska Event occurred.

The Broom Closet: In or Out?

So, in or out?

I actually had almost talked myself out of writing anything on this subject. "It's been done to death," I told myself. "It's been hashed out endlessly, over and over again," I told myself. "What would be the point of one more article on the subject?" I asked myself.

And then I reminded myself that I'm a guy with a few things to say, and enough chutzpah to think other people actually care.

In a slightly more serious vein, I also read "Yes, Wiccan" on Witchvox, which reminded me that this is hardly a topic that has a final consensus or an easy answer.

In or out? It's not as easy as we'd like it to be, and it's not as simple as we'd like it to be. We've all heard of the Witch's Pyramid ("to know, to will, to dare, to keep silent", a statement I've seen in sources as far back as the works of Eliaphus Levi), and the Gardnerian Book of Shadows enjoins secrecy in the "Ardains". Secrecry is engrained into the world of the pagan and the occult[1] practitioner.

Hell, we sometimes even make a virtue of secrecy. Peter Paddon - host of the late and lamented podcast The Crooked Path - pointed out that witches are creatures of the shadows, something that I believe is true of any occultist. We're boundary creatures, living on the (literal or metaphorical) edge of the community. Some of the work we do just doesn't work very well with a light shining directly on it.

(Yeah, really. Don't believe me? Do the Symbolic Great Rite at your next Pagan Pride Day then, or work the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram in your cubicle. I'll be interested to hear the results.)

On the other hand, we're all human. Humans are community creatures - we're primates, and most primates live in bands. Being on the edge of the community is uncomfortably like being ostracised, except for when it actually is being ostracised. We're cut off, and we don't like it. And so - and this is especially true for those of us who are more interested in the mystical and religious aspect of paganism than in the occult aspect of paganism - we fight back. We demand to be recognized, resent being marginalized, and resent ourselves when we allow ourselves to be marginalized.

We want rights. We want dignity. We want to be able to practice our religion with the same freedom that anyone else in our country has. We want to be able to wear hubcap-sized pagan bling without being laughed at[2]. But we don't want to be trivialized. We don't want to have to have daily discussions about the health and future destination of our souls, and we don't want to risk our jobs and our families.

So, where does that leave us?

The same place it always does. In the awkward position of having to make our own decisions, for our own reasons, and then having to live with the consequences. And in the position of needing to respect the decisions of others, and of allowing them to live with the consequences. You plays your cards and you takes your chances, as the saying goes.

And me? Well, I'm sitting comfortably in the closet with the door wide open.

---

[1]Occult. from the latin occultus (ptp. of occulere to hide from view, cover up). See dictionary.com for details.

[2]This really ain't gonna happen. Any flavor of hubcap-sized bling is a laughing matter, and I for one feel no guilt about joining in the mockery.

Tools: Extensions of the Body

I originally heard about this on Scientific American's 60-Second Science podcast: Tool-use induces morphological updating of the body schema.

You have to register to read the full article, but the abstract is as follows:

To control bodily movements the human brain relies on a somatosensory representation referred to as the body schema. The almost century-old hypothesis that tool-use induces plastic changes resulting in the tool being incorporated in the body schema is nowadays widely accepted. Whether this somatosensory representation is truly modified remains unknown, however, as tool-use has never been shown to affect arm motor behaviour. Here we report that using a mechanical grabber that physically extends the arm does alter the kinematics of subsequent free-hand grasping movements. Remarkably, tool-use after-effects generalise to pointing movements, despite the absence of specific tool-training. Furthermore, this effect is driven by an increase of the represented length of the arm: after tool-use, subjects localised touches delivered on the elbow and middle fingertip of their arm as if they were farther apart. These findings indicate that tool-use alters the body schema, and also show that what is modified is the somatosensory representation of intrinsic properties of the body morphology.

Essentially, your brain appears to assimilate tools that you are using into your body schema, treating them as extensions of your limbs. Even after the tool is put down, it takes a few minutes for it to leave the body schema.

Not being a biologist (or having read much more than the abstract at this point), I'm a little reluctant to push this too far. But it's interesting.

The Name is the Thing. The Symbol is the Thing Symbolized.

Let's try a little experiment. What is the first thing you think of when you see this?


Or this?


How about this?


And this?


And, finally, this?


Now, ask yourself this: why did you have those reactions? They're just pictures, after all. What made you react the way you did?

Relax, there's no right or wrong answer here. I can probably guess how you reacted to a few of them, but it really doesn't matter. What is important is that you reacted. Webster's Unabridged Dictionary tells us that a symbol is

A visible sign or representation of an idea; anything which suggests an idea or quality, or another thing, as by resemblance or by convention; an emblem; a representation; a type; a figure; as, the lion is the symbol of courage; the lamb is the symbol of meekness or patience.

All symbols have power. They are designed to associate a most likely abstract (and often quite complex) concept with an image of some sort. They make ideas into things, things that can be grasped easily and associated with powerful emotions. Things - when charged with emotion - take on a life of their own, becoming something greater than the simple cloth or ink or stone that transmit them.

They can also be manipulated to bring about results. Priests and politicians, the successful ones at least, understand this. Advertisers are masters of this. The proper symbols, properly applied, can change the course of rivers, move mountains, take men to the stars, or leave nations in ruins.

As practitioners of the magical arts[1], we need to be able to work with them as well. In order to do this successfully, there are a few steps to take.

First, be aware of the symbols in your world and what they do to you. No matter where you live or what you do, you come into frequent contact with symbols throught out your day. Start paying attention to them. Ask yourself what effect they have on you. What thoughts and feelings do they provoke? What actions do they encourage you to take? How do they provoke those feelings? Why do you respond that way?

Second, and this can (and probably will) run concurrently with the first, what do those symbols do to others? Do some people watching. If you're comfortable with doing so, ask questions. Do they react the same way you do?

Third, and this will be extremely difficult, do your best to consciously control your response to symbols. Make yourself acknowledge that your thought or action is driven by a reaction to a symbol, and then determine if you still want to take that action. You may still chose to do so - there's probably nothing wrong with that - but do it consciously. You want to be able to manipulate the symbol, not be manipulated by it.

Fourth, make and/or hijack symbols for your own purposes. At this point in the "exercise", you should have a pretty good handle on what symbols are and how they work. So roll your own. Design a sigil as a focus point for your next spell, and incorporate elements from existing symbols that create the thoughts and emotions you need. Don't be shy about using (or at least incorporating) existing symbols that meet your needs.

---

[1]There really needs to be a less cumbersome inclusive phrase to use here. "Practitioners of the magical arts" is bulky, but we're not all witches. Or wizards. Or shamans. Or magi. Or energy workers. Or anything else. I'm open to suggestions, if anyone has any.

Magic and Mysticism, Skepticism and Science (Part Two)

"Humans are amphibians - half spirit and half animal. As spirits they belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time."
--C. S. Lewis

In the last entry with this title, I wandered far afield from the point I was going to try to make. So, let's revisit the topic and see if I can manage to stay on track this time.

Today we'll be talking about "Magic and Mysticism, Skepticism and Science." That's the guiding motto of my blog, but what exactly do I mean by that? How do these subjects fit together? Heck, do they fit together?

I say they do. In fact I will go so far as to say that not only do they go together, they have to go together.

Magic and mysticism go together pretty well. As I see it, they're two sides of the same coin. Magic is (in my opinion) to mysticism as electrical engineering is to physics. A mystic doesn't really need to do magic, and a magician typically doesn't have to have a mystic bent to get results, but each can benefit greatly from at least a little knowledge of what the other is up to. Skepticism and science are also two great tastes that taste great together. Science daily pushes the boundaries of what we know about the universe, and skepticism asks the hard questions about whether or not that knowledge is genuine.

But why would science and magic go together? Or mysticism and skepticism?

Because each challenges the other. Mysticism allows us to seek the transcendent, to search out things and worlds of the spirit, to achieve union with the Divine. Magic is the tool kit, applying the insights of the mystic to achieve results in the higher worlds and in this world. Both are challenged by science and skepticism, which rightly point out that there can be other explanations and that there is a genuine possibility that we are deluding ourselves.

But this doesn't mean that science and skepticism are the unchallenged dispensers of Truth and the sole arbiters of reason and understanding. Magic and mysticism challenge science and skepticism, pointing out that we are more than just stimulus-response biochemical robots and that "there are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy".

Be skeptical. There are limits to human knowledge. There are things that we will never know the answer to. But never give up on the search for knowledge. Be mystical. Believe a dozen impossible things each day before breakfast. Remember that, just because something can't be put in a test tube or smashed together at CERN, doesn't mean that it isn't real.

Never stop asking questions. Never stop looking for answers.

Quick Announcement

If you live in the Cincinnati area, be sure to check out the Greater Cincinnati Pagan Pride Day. It's happening May 2nd, from 11 AM until sundown at Sycamore Park in Batavia. I'll be there, running the children's activities (wand making and runestaves), so stop by and say hello.

Skepticism? What's That Good For?

As is my pedantic wont, I'll start the answer by defining the term. Skepticism is defined on Dictionary.com as:

1. A doubting or questioning attitude or state of mind; dubiety.
2. Philosophy

• The ancient school of Pyrrho of Elis that stressed the uncertainty of our beliefs in order to oppose dogmatism.
• The doctrine that absolute knowledge is impossible, either in a particular domain or in general.
• A methodology based on an assumption of doubt with the aim of acquiring approximate or relative certainty.

3. Doubt or disbelief of religious tenets.

This is all well and good, but it's not precisely where I'm going with this. A more commonly understood meaning for "skepticism" is what is known as scientific skepticism, which is a critical "examination of claims and theories which appear to be beyond mainstream science" (to quote Wikipedia). Scientific skepticism relies on a rigorous investigation of claims to establish validity and (rightly, in my opinion) holds that exceptional claims require exceptional evidence. The idea is that if you're going to claim some knowledge or discovery that flies in the face of everything we currently understand about the subject, that's fine. But if your claims aren't testable and aren't reproducible, it is possible - just possible - that maybe you haven't revolutionized the field and the "scientific establishment" isn't trying to suppress your discovery to retain a stranglehold on the masses. Maybe you're just, in a word, wrong.

But what, in the name of Eris, does this have to do with the occult?

The answer isn't a hundred percent straight forward.

Magic and mysticism have a bit of a checkered history with science. The kind of history where Science hopes nobody sees those old Spring Break in Cabo pictures that it put up on its Myspace page back in the day. Nowadays Science is more respectable, and has largely put all that behind it. But every once in a while Magic and Mysticism show up in town, drunk and horny and needing a place to crash for a few days. If Science lets them stay it usually ends up broke, hung over, and the proud owner of a nasty and suspicious rash. If it doesn't, it looks like a jerk and everybody gives it crap for not helping its buddies out.

Here's the thing: occultists frequently - not always, but frequently - are in the position of making extraordinary claims. Scientists want to see proof for those claims. Verifiable, reproducible proof. Then, if the results claimed can be verified and reproduced, they want to look and see what the mechanics are behind those results. Just because something works, doesn't mean it works for the reasons claimed.

I'm not down on magic or mysticism. Obviously - I'm writing a blog called "On Occult Philosophy", after all. I do directed meditation and spellwork, and I believe in spirits and Gods. But I am tired of the New Age willingness to try justify questionable (and even outright absurd) beliefs through pseudoscience and bad science.

There is wonder and majesty in the universe, and science is the tool that has given us the greatest insight into how it works. Take some time from your quaint and curious volumes of forgotten lore to study the new discoveries and new lore as well.

After all, if you're probably not bleeding yourself to rebalance your humours when you get sick. Take advantage of the newest discoveries and blend them with what works for you from your current practices.

You might just learn something new.

Ben Kenobi was right

So I just finished reading an article called Mind tricks: Six ways to explore your brain, originally posted on NewScientist back in 2007, which covers six different weird games you can play with your brain. Some of my favorite details are that:

1. You are blind about 3 times a second, due to the fact that your brain attempts to edit out jerky eye movements between images. You don't notice because (a) those moments of blindness are milliseconds long and (b) your brain will extrapolate from image to image and essentially "make up" what it thinks would have happened during the blindness. (Oh, and your sense of hearing does the same thing.)
2. You have a body-wide network of proprioceptive sensors that monitors your awareness of your own body. These sensors can be tricked, making you think parts of your body are stretching or even that things that obviously aren't part of your body really are.
3. Pendulum dowsing, no matter what you may think of dowsing as a magical art, is a functional way of interacting with your subconscious. And your subconscious is something of a racist jerk.
4. You most likely will not notice dramatic changes to your surroundings, as long as you are either distracted at the moment of change or the change happens quickly enough (or, oddly enough, slowly enough), or if you become focused on something else.
5. You can and will make up memories. And you will believe those memories are genuine.

The point? Does there really have to be one, beyond "hey, isn't this cool"?

Do You Really Want A Break Today?

We're talking about egregores today. Egregores, and a satori moment I had while talking magical theory with my wife last week.

First, a little background. An egregore (which may also be called a thoughtform) can be thought of in a number of different ways. You can think of one as a gestalt entity, made up of the collective wills of a group of people come together to achieve a purpose. You can think of one as a truly elaborate sigil, allowing an individual or group to focus Will towards a specific purpose. It could be a separate and distinct spiritual entity, created by one or more individuals to aid in magical work, or nothing more than an arbitrary anthropomorphism of a meme.

Really, from a magical perspective, it can be all of the above simultaneously.

There's a lot more to the subject, obviously, and this barely scratches the surface. Eventually we'll get to information and some of my theories about what they are, but that's not the purpose of today's post. We're talking right now about how these entities interact with us in our daily lives.

We live in an amazingly religious age. Hymns of praise bombard us constantly. Icons and images and enactments of myth are everywhere we look and everywhere we go. The faith determines every aspect of our lives: when we eat, what we drink, what we wear, how we speak, the pursuits we follow, even what we think about. Every day sacrifices of time, of wealth, and of energy are poured into the object of devotion, sustaining and supporting it.

I'm lovin' it.

Save money. Live better.

Citi never sleeps.

These are some of the liturgies of the modern gods, egregores built up over millions of man-hours dedicated to developing and nurturing and growing the corporations. Legally, a corporation is an entity. Magically, a corporation is also an entity. An entity empowered by the blood and sweat and tears of thousands and thousands of employees. An entity with needs and desires separate from those of any single human being involved.

Don't believe me? Ask yourself this - particularly if you work for a corporation. How many times have you heard a phrase used like "this is in the best interests of [the company]" or "the direction [the company] is taking" or even "[the company] is laying off 5% of its workforce"? Contrast this with the number of times that you have heard a phrase like "this is in the best interests of the employees" or "the direction the senior vice president in charge of marketing is taking" or "the board of directors has unanimously voted to lay off 5% of the workforce".

These entities do not care about us. Individual humans are classified by them as either "headcount" or "customer" - which can be understood as "property" or "food", respectively. They aren't evil, precisely, they just do what they were created to do. It's just that what they were created to do is pursue the short-term best interests of (first) themselves, (second) the cabal of high priests that interprets their will, and (third) the shareholders. And that short-term interest doesn't care who or what gets trampled, exploited, or destroyed in the process. If they think about it at all, they decide it's a concern for the next quarter.

So where does that leave us? Well, that depends, to a degree, on your feelings about corporate America and the influence it has over our lives. But at bare minimum - whether you call yourself a priest, a witch, a magician, a neoshaman, a cunning man, or anything else - if you are practicing the art of magic you have taken a step into a wider world. A world where symbols are substance and the spiritual is as important as the material. These entities are out there. Deal with them or contest with them as you wish - but you need to recognize that they are there and you need to be aware of the influence they have on you before you start.

Oh, and the possibility of interpreting the current financial crisis as a Götterdämmerung? I'll leave that as an exercise for the reader.

Magic and mysticism, science and skepticism (part one)

In the first book of Henry Agrippa's Three Books of Occult Philosophy, we get the following quote from chapter 2:

Whosoever therefore is desirous to study in this faculty [magic], if he be not skilled in natural philosophy, wherein are discovered the qualities of things, and in which are found the occult properties of every being, and if he be not skillful in the mathematics, and in the aspects, and figures of the stars, upon which depends the sublime virtue, and property of everything; and if he be not learned in theology, wherein are manifested those immaterial substances, which dispense and minister all things, he cannot be possibly able to understand the rationality of magic. For there is no work that is done by mere magic, nor any work that is merely magical, that doth not comprehend these three faculties.

Now - obviously - this doesn't restrict the practice of magic to the lofty realms of individuals who have earned three or four PhDs in wildly unrelated fields. Magic is a practical art first and foremost - it always has been, and it always will be. It's wired into our brains and our blood and our bones, whether we recognize it or not. It doesn't require any special training to perform, or to get results.

That probably sounds like rank heresy to any number of people, but hear me out.

There's nothing special about doing magic. Pretty much any human being can focus his Will to achieve some goal. If that human focuses long enough then something - call it coincidence, call it synchronicity, call it magic, call it prayer, call it whatever you like - something happens.

And that's magic in a nutshell: causing change in accordance with your Will.

So, then, if magic can be done by anybody at any time with no training whatsoever, why on Earth am I studying the 800-some pages of dense 16th century occultism that is the Three Books of Occult Philosophy? Why would budding magi pursue initiation into the Golden Dawn or the OTO? Why go through the year and a day of training in Wicca or the ADF, or practice the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram or the Middle Pillar exercise?

Because - in the same way any person can do magic - any person can run, or jump, or reason. Some people might even have a natural talent for it. But without practice, without training, without the constant striving to improve, you never get better at it.